Page 247 of Blood of Hercules
I was trapped.
Nyx was incapacitated.
No one knew where we were.
No one was coming to save us.
Bird sounds echoed as dark gray lightened with sunrise.
Dawn had arrived.
Another horrible noise echoed through the woods, much closer than the last. A Titan was fast approaching.
With us tied up like this, it would rip us both apart with its talons.
We’d be easy to kill.
You can do this, Alexis. Think. Think.
I looked around, but there was nothing I could reach to help me. No sharp edge to dig the rope against. There was no slack around my wrists—they were bound painfully tight. Theros knew what he was doing.
Breathing roughly through my nose, I bowed my head and muttered a prayer.
You know exactly what you need to do. It’s your only chance of saving Helen. Charlie is waiting for you to come home.
I did.
But I didn’t want to do it.
It’s not fair.
The Titan screamed. It was approaching. Fast.
DO IT.
Clenching my jaw as tightly as possible, refusing to think about it, I lifted my tied hands above my head and slammed them down as hard as I could against the floor.
Shrieking, I did it again.
And again.
Time distorted in a blur of déjà vu.
I was ten years old, banging my wrists against rocks to get out of ropes; I was almost twenty years old, slamming my hands down against the ground to dislocate my thumbs;I sobbed, snot running down my face; I bellowed through the pain.
Again and again.
Pulling, I yanked while I fractured bones.
I shrieked at the blinding agony, then tugged harder.
Shattered bones poked through rope-burned skin.
Millimeter by millimeter, mangled hands slipped through a much too small opening.
Helen woke up and started shouting something, but I couldn’t comprehend anything she was saying over the screaming pain.
My vision blurred like I was going to pass out, and I blinked rapidly.
